


Hamaguri Rebellion

by Legume_Shadow



Series: Echoes: A Peacemaker Kurogane/Rurouni Kenshin Crossover [2]
Category: Peacemaker Kurogane, Rurouni Kenshin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Author Loves Writing the Meiji Revolution, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-15
Updated: 2011-11-15
Packaged: 2017-12-28 06:26:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/988793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Legume_Shadow/pseuds/Legume_Shadow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One month after the Ikedaya Incident, disaster strikes as rebel forces launch a surprise attack on Kyoto.  Though Tetsu has matured since Ikedaya, is he ready to face a real battlefield?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hamaguri Rebellion

**Author's Note:**

> First Publishing: November 2011. All copyrights apply to the appropriate parties and no profit is being made from this fanwork.

**Part 2: Hamaguri Rebellion**

_Year: One month after Ikedaya, 1864_

 

“Again!”

Susumu watched with mild interest as the wooden floor shook again with the slam of a body onto it that was accompanied by a grunt. He saw Kai step back a bit to let Aoshi get up again after the young boy had tried to disarm Kai of the small wooden knife he was holding but failed to and had ended up on the ground. The boy charged at Kai again with barely a sound and this time, with a slightly different movement from his first time, he managed to disarm Kai, but tripped and crashed to the floor in an undignified heap.

He looked up as Aya, with a stern look on her face, got up and approached the pair, holding out her hand to stop them from trying the technique again. He didn’t hear her say anything and saw her shake her head at Kai before the tall shinobi came back and sat next to him.

“So what’s going on?” he asked him.

“Dunno,” Kai answered, shrugging.

He heard hurried footsteps approach from outside of the training hall and turned to see Tetsu approach who was followed closely by Okita. He saw that Okita was dressed in a hakama and gi and had his hair tied up – clearly Tetsu had requested to practice against Okita…again. He was about to wave Tetsu back to not enter just yet, when he heard Aya say, “Okita-sensei, Ichimura-san.”

“Aya-nee!” Tetsu happily said as he entered, grinning in what Susumu thought to be like an idiot. “Aoshi! Whatcha doing?”

“Training,” came the simple answer as he saw Aya bow a bit towards Okita before saying, “If you would permit my apprentice and me one last training session before beginning your class with Ichimura-san, Okita-sensei.”

“Please take your time, Matsumoto-san,” Okita replied in a good-natured tone, waving his hands a bit. “Would you permit Tetsu-kun and I to watch?”

“Both of you are welcome to,” Susumu heard Aya reply. “This session should not last too long.” Turning to Aoshi she said, “The Blind Lady, if you would please.”

As Tetsu and Okita sat down next to Kai and him, it was Okita who whispered to him, asking, “What is ‘The Blind Lady’?”

“The Blind Lady,” he stated, closing his eyes briefly and opening them back as he saw both Aya and Aoshi prepare themselves. He had thought Aoshi’s training session had gone on quite well, but it seemed that Aya thought otherwise. “It’s better done on a late winter’s day out in a bamboo forest for both the acoustics and the hazards it creates, but I guess a training hall might also give some of the same things. It’s a training technique that few have ever used, due to the sheer skill it takes to actually make it work correctly for both the trainee and trainer.”

“I heard that if you were a glutton for punishment, you’d ask the _fukuchou_ to do The Blind Lady with you,” Kai quipped.

“Eh, _fukuchou_?” Tetsu asked, confused.

“Machimaki Haruka,” Susumu answered. “She is the _fukuchou_ of the Oniwabanshuu. Her father is the _Okashira_ , or leader, of our group. They’re both based in Edo.”

“Oh,” the young page said, before asking, “So why is it called ‘The Blind Lady’?”

“Because it’s based on the idiom that every person on the street may be harmless, but in reality, they can be anyone or anything. It forces us to keep vigilance and to be always aware of our surroundings. The actual training was developed and implemented by our primary trainer before she died two years ago,” he said, watching as both Aoshi and Aya put on frictionless tabi on their feet. “Since her death, it’s not practiced that often anymore because so few of us have mastered it. It’s also as Kai said…if you’re a glutton for punishment; you’d go ask a person who’s mastered it to do it with you. Very few ever do ask.”

“You ever had done it before, Susumu?” Kai conversationally asked.

Susumu could not help but wince a bit at the memory and said, “Yeah. It was with our primary trainer before she died. I didn’t ask for it though – I was forced to. It was not fun. I had my ass handed to me each time I tried to attack ‘The Blind Lady’ or defend against her attacks.” He was most definitely not afraid to admit that, for it had been the toughest part of his training that he had to go through before he and his sister had been assigned to the Roshigumi and left for Kyoto.

“Ouch,” Kai said, shaking his head a bit. “I never got to do it, or see it being done, but man… can I assume that the tabi they’re wearing accounts for the snow?”

“Yeah,” Susumu said, looking around. “At least the walls are sort of acoustically tuned…though a bamboo forest would definitely be much better with all the ambient noise. We don’t have sharp shoots of bamboo growing out of the snow though…”

“Aya-nee is wrapping her arms,” Tetsu quietly said, tilting his head a bit in confusion.

Susumu saw that indeed, Aya had pulled out the black wrappings from the satchel she had carried in earlier and was wrapping the long strips of cloth around her hands, wrists, and forearms. Aoshi was now calmly sitting at the end of the training hall, in a meditative pose with two short wooden blades lying in front of him. His preparation had only been to find the wooden blades he had fashioned less than a month ago from two broken bokken. Two more long strips of cloth emerged from Aya’s satchel as she methodically wound those around her legs, binding the loose flowing training pants she wore all the way up to her knees.

“Unarmed Blind Lady,” he supplied. “The base technique of the entire Blind Lady training regime. She will be The Blind Lady and Aoshi will be the attacker. If he can get through her defenses to provoke her into attacking, it then turns her into an attacking Blind Lady and him the defensive person.”

“That seems a little unfair,” Tetsu protested. “Aoshi has a weapon and Aya-nee does not.”

“If she can take his weapons at any point, it won’t be,” he said, clearly remembering his own session at The Blind Lady. “It’s a training regimen designed for both. Sometimes, you could have both start out with weapons, sometimes you don’t. It’s all dependent on the preference of both of them. It’s also psychologically aimed at the trainee to force the trainee to use every technique he or she has learned thus far. It ends only when the trainee defeats The Blind Lady or vice versa.”

“Or when one of them gets stabbed by a bamboo shoot growing out of the ground,” Kai muttered a bit darkly.

“Or that,” Susumu said, carelessly shrugging. It was not that he was being flippant about the training technique or the dangers of it; it was just that it had never come down to that. “It’s never gotten that far though,” he told them. “Usually the trainee gets knocked out after two or three attempts and then we call it a day.”

“Oh…now I see why it’s called ‘The Blind Lady’,” Tetsu said after a few moments of silence as they saw Aya finished wrapping herself and walk to the center of the training hall and sat in seiza before wrapping a thick piece of dark cloth around her eyes and secured it with a tight knot.

Silence engulfed the training hall as Susumu watched as not a minute later; Aoshi opened his eyes and slowly stood up, quietly taking the two wooden kodachi from the floor with barely a sound. There was no sound at all as Aoshi slowly advanced across the wooden floor, sliding his tabi-covered feet on the polished wooden floor. Susumu frowned and leaned forward a bit, placing a hand on the floor. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Kai to the same and glanced over at the big shinobi. A silent nod of affirmation was all he needed to confirm what the two of them had felt…or rather not felt.

There was no vibration of footsteps on the wooden floor as Aoshi continued to slowly advance. At only twelve years of age, the boy had _mastered_ the shadow-walking technique.

As he sat back, Susumu could not help but feel as if what he was about to witness would be on a far greater level than what he had gone through when he had attempted this training. When Aoshi was only a few footsteps away from Aya, with his twin wooden blades held out to the side in an open fashion, Susumu saw the kunoichi rise up to a standing position without a sound.

 

It was eerily quiet around the training hall and Tetsu could not help but feel a chill crawl up his spine.

Without warning, that silence was shattered with _both_ Aoshi and Aya launching a simultaneous attack at each other, and despite being the ‘blind’ one, Tetsu clearly saw that Aya had spun right at where Aoshi was and landed a solid kick right in the middle of Aoshi’s stomach as her arms were brought up to deflect one of the wooden blades that had tried to crash down upon her head. He saw Aoshi stagger back a bit, breathing hard as Aya remained where she was, head slightly tilted. Neither of them was slipping on the polished floor, despite the tabi that they were wearing.

He realized that Aya was _listening_ , carefully, for the sounds around her and watched as Aoshi quickly calmed his breathing until Tetsu could not even hear it anymore. In the second time that both attacked each other at the same time, Tetsu felt a distinctly sharp _force_ push at him briefly, almost knocking him over, before it quickly disappeared as he saw Aoshi’s second attempt fail again with one of his blades being knocked from his hand and clattered to the floor. He saw Aya quickly strike with an open palm before landing a quick succession of kicks and punches that whittled what little defense Aoshi had put up. With each successive hit that Aya was raining upon Aoshi, Tetsu again felt the same distinctly sharp _force_ push at him.

However, Aoshi did not give up and despite slipping briefly on the floor, turned their height difference to his advantage and lashed out with a foot while at the same time, reversed his hold on the other blade and spun, using the slippery floor and the momentum of his attempted spinning kick to bring the blade up in a swipe that briefly connected with the back of Aya’s legs, sending her crashing to the floor.

Instead of landing in a heap, Tetsu saw Aya use the fall to her advantage by rolling back up into a crouch, again, listening very carefully as Aoshi had also rolled away and snatched up his dropped blade.

“The ki would have bounced off the bamboo,” he heard Susumu murmur. “It’s only being absorbed by the walls here.”

“So he’s not getting the distractive echoes,” Kai said, putting a hand to his chin as Aoshi stood tensed, facing Aya, who was not directly looking at him. “He’s lucky.”

Tetsu suddenly felt a chill engulf him as he found his gaze being inexplicably drawn from watching Aya turn her head slowly from side to side, as if seeing the training hall around her, to Aoshi, who bent his knees a bit and drew his right leg back, as if preparing a long-ranged attack. He could not help but wonder how Aoshi was going to do it, for all he held were short swords…

 

_Lucky or unlucky_ , Susumu thought to himself as he saw Aoshi bend his knees slightly while drawing back his right leg. Susumu’s eyes widened a bit as he recognized that stance – Kaiten Kenbu. This was going to be interesting…for he knew that the style of fighting was more suited in a visual sense than against a blinded opponent.

“Kaiten Kenbu?” he heard Kai whisper to him.

“Eh?” Tetsu said before he could reply.

“It’s a shinobi-specific sword style Aoshi uses,” he quickly answered.

There was no reply from Tetsu as Aoshi suddenly threw one of his wooden kodachi towards Aya at a very high speed before he swiftly charged straight at his master. Susumu thought he had initially seen the second blade still in the boy’s hand, but it was not, as the first blade reached Aya who dodged it by leaning to the side but did not fully deflect the hidden second blade which had been thrown on exactly the same path as the first.

Aya had raised her arms to block the sudden appearance of the second blade, and that was when Aoshi struck with a nearly blinding combination of quick punches and advancing footwork. He saw Aya being forced back, slipping very slightly on the polished floor due to the speed in which she had to use to counteract the attack. However, Susumu saw that even with the height advantage that Aoshi had over Aya, with Aya being at least a head-and-a-half shorter than Aoshi, the speed in which the boy was attack was causing him to overbalance himself. That was proven only a second later when he saw Aya deliberately leaned back further than necessary, before lashing out and grabbing one of Aoshi’s outstretched arms, and pivoted. However, like a nimble cat, Susumu saw Aoshi turn into the pivot, regain some semblance of his balance and saw him place several pressure points, just as Aya reached out with a free hand and did the same to him.

Both master and student crashed spectacularly to the floor, incapacitated from moving with their mutual pressure point attacks. The entire exercise had taken less than five minutes to complete, from start to finish.

“A draw?” he heard Kai ask as he stared at the two of them.

“Hey Susumu…Kai,” he heard Aya croak from where she was laying, splayed out in a near-spread-eagle fashion, while Aoshi had fallen into a completely frozen horizontal position on the floor, a few steps away from her. “A little help here, please.”

Susumu could not help but grin slightly to himself as he and Kai got up from where they had been sitting and approached. “I’m assuming you’re done,” he said as he crouched next to Aya.

“Yes,” the kunoichi replied. “Five-star paralysis,” she stated after a moment. “Both of us.”

Susumu reached out and placed the appropriate counter-pressure points to release her body quickly from the temporary paralysis. The type of paralysis that both Aya and Aoshi had mutually inflicted on each other was able to be eased off naturally by the body except for the fact that it took about twelve hours for it to fully wear off. Aya immediately rolled to her side and up as she took the blindfold off. As Susumu stood up, he saw that Aoshi had also been released from paralysis and had already gotten up and was gathering his thrown swords from where they had scattered to a stop.

“That was amazing!” he heard Tetsu exclaim as he turned slightly to see his friend getting up and run over to them. Okita had also stood up but stayed back, watching them with a serene look, despite what had just happened.

“So what was that technique, Aoshi?” the young page asked Aoshi who had merely given a silent nod to Aya who had returned that nod, indicating that the young boy was now dismissed from the training session. Susumu knew that one might have perceived a simple nod without any formality such as bowing after a class, as rude, but for them, everything was as simple as possible – their work relied on informal situations.

“Onmyou Hasshi,” the boy quietly said, taking the items that he had brought to the training hall into his hands.

“We are now finished, Okita-sensei,” Aya said, bowing slightly towards Okita, having also picked up her satchel, but had not removed the bindings on her legs or arms just yet. “Thank you for your patience.”

“Thank you for letting Tetsu-kun and I observe,” Okita replied.

The four of them left the training hall, leaving Tetsu to practice sparring against Okita, though Susumu was sure that the young page was probably now more distracted than he usually was. However, he wondered why Aya had allowed outsiders to watch an exercise that was not normally done for public viewing, for when Susumu had gone through the training, a few of their sessions had been open to whoever happened to walk past the gardens back in Edo castle. The public sessions had been to let the trainees get used to working in crowds of random strangers and to learn how to be more subtle. The Blind Lady exercise was geared towards combat… a sudden idea sprung up in his mind. The three had been here for a month and there was no doubt that all of them had picked up on Tetsu’s unbridled enthusiasm in the Shinsengumi and the fact that Hijikata had ensured that even after Ikedaya, Tetsu remained a page. Tetsu was still insanely curious about what the shinobi did, but Susumu knew that the others would not tell him things, so had Aya done this for the benefit to dissuade Tetsu from asking too many questions?

“Hey Aya,” Kai said, interrupting Susumu’s thoughts as they were walking back to their quarters. “Can you do The Blind Lady with me in a couple of months? I want to test myself.”

“I’d be more than happy to,” Aya said. “However, just because you’ve never done it before does not mean I will be easy on you.”

“Okay!” Kai said with quite a bit of enthusiasm in his voice, to which Susumu mentally shook his head, putting his thoughts about Tetsu aside. The big shinobi was definitely asking for it, for the caliber that he had seen Aoshi and Aya approach the exercise was combat-leveled. Still, he was not going to tell his friend that…at least not until _after_ Kai tried it.

* * *

_Later that morning…_

 

The piglets squirmed and squealed as they pushed each other aside to get to the small trough of food that had just been set inside the pen while their mother lumbered behind them.

“There’ll be nothing left for your mother at this rate,” Aya muttered, sighing a bit as she leaned against the fence of the pen, with one of her arms propped up against her chin, as she stared at the piglets. “Stop being gluttons, you guys…”

Another piglet, smaller than average, was suddenly dropped into the pen amongst his brothers and sisters and squirmed his way through to get to the trough, giving a small squeal of success as he buried almost half of his nose into the food and greedily gobbled it up.

Startled by the sudden intrusion, she looked up and flushed pink in embarrassment as she quickly scrambled up and apologized, saying, “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t see you there.”

The light laughter of Okita served to cause her to feel further ashamed for her lack of awareness as he said, “It is very rare to see you so out of it that you did not even hear or see me approach, Aya-san.”

“I…have a few things on my mind, sir,” she replied. “It won’t happen again.”

“Please, it is all right,” Okita said, waving his hands a bit, giving her a smile of reassurance. “And please, I meant to say this earlier, but have we not been friends with each other for so long that you do not have to call me ‘sir’?”

“To not do so in public would be disrespectful towards you, sir,” she said, frowning a bit. “If you would also permit me to say, it has also been over two years since we last spoke or seen each other. We both have changed.”

“Yes, we have,” Okita said after a moment, his tone no longer cheerful but almost melancholic as the smile disappeared from his face and he glanced at the happily oblivious pigs consuming their meal without a care in the world.

“We are also now working within the same group,” she reminded him. “We are no longer the free birds as we had been in Edo. You outrank me in more ways than one.”

“I may,” he answered, returning his gaze to her, “but you still speak your mind as you have done many times before.” In a more positive tone, he asked, “With your permission, I would like to become friends again.”

She was quiet for a long moment before saying, “In the eyes of the others, I cannot, for it would give a negative impression on both you and me and also dishonor you, for my way of life are not that of a samurai as yours is. Such as it is in the Shinsengumi that we serve that many secrets cannot be kept from hungry ears. However, there may be times, such as now, where the eyes of others are not always upon us, and it is then that I would also like to get to know you again, my friend.”

“You always were careful about appearances, were you not, Aya-san?”

“As I recall, so were you, Souji-kun,” she replied.

“Am I a little old for that?”

“You keep calling me with that honorific and I’ll keep calling you with that honorific,” she said, raising an eyebrow. “In the past, you’ve never called me with that honorific and now, it makes me sound old. I’m only twenty-four. I’m not an old granny yet, you young whippersnapper.”

“That is the Matsumoto Aya that I remember,” he said, the smile returning to his face. “Always speaking her mind without a care for consequences…”

“Whereas you’ve gotten more polite and a lot better at hiding your feelings,” she countered, though she did not mean to sound accusatory as she saw the smile on Okita’s face disappear once again. “I apologize,” she quickly said. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“A lot has happened since we last saw or spoke to each other,” he quietly said. “Perhaps now is not the time to look back on the past. I would rather look to the future.”

“I understand, and again, I apologize,” she said, bowing slightly before straightening and glanced over at the piglets. In an attempt to inject some levity into the atmosphere which had gone from friendly to downright gloomy, she said, “Your piglet is a fast eater.”

“Ah, Saizou,” Okita said, the humor back in his voice as he picked up the stuffed piglet who looked sleepily at him before he placed the piglet back down into the pen. The piglet wandered off a bit before colliding right into his mother and then flopped to his side, instantly asleep. “He was the smallest of them, so I encouraged him to eat fast so that he would not be hungry before his brothers and sisters ate all the food.”

“You named the piglet ‘Saizou’?” she asked, incredulous. “After Kirigakure Saizou of the _Sanada Ten Braves_?”

“Yes,” Okita earnestly nodded. “He was my favorite character to read about in those stories.”

Just as she was about to say a something with regards to the popular stories about the legendary group of shinobi who had assisted the warlord Sanada Yukimura during the Sengoku era and about the piglet, a panicked shout was heard from the courtyard. “Kondou- _kyokuchou_! Hijikata- _fukuchou_! Yamanami- _fukuchou_!”

The two of them were not the only ones who had gravitated towards the courtyard in curiosity as the Shinsengumi commander appeared a moment later. A few others who had been sparring in the nearby training hall, along with Kai, Aoshi, and Susumu, had appeared at the sounds of the commotion. Kondou was closely followed by Hijikata and Yamanami, and raised his eyebrows slightly at the sight of the young boy dressed in Matusdaira-clan colors, calmly standing next to the Shinsengumi member who had shouted for his commander and vice-commanders.

“Sir,” the young boy said bowing a bit before straightening with barely a greeting or preamble. The boy handed Kondou a letter and said, “I come on behalf of my master, Lord Matsudaira Katamori. I have two things to tell you, Kondou- _kyokuchou_. First, Choshuu armies have been sighted and are approaching the city. Lord Tokugawa Yoshinobu and my master request your aid at once to defend Hamaguri Gates.”

“Toshi, Keisuke,” Kondou said, quickly reading through the letter before giving a nod to the vice-commanders as those within the vicinity heard the orders and immediately scattered to begin preparations to go into battle. “What is the second thing?” the commander asked.

“My master requests that this be passed on to a skilled assassin within your ranks, sir,” the page stated, taking out a small, folded rectangular piece of black paper and handed it to the commander whose eyes widened only slightly in surprise.

A few more curt words were exchanged between the commander and the page before the page gave a bow and left. With the other members of the Shinsengumi already beginning preparations to march into battle, only the four shinobi and their commander remained in the courtyard.

“Shinomori,” the commander tersely said, “go into the city and find the others.” The young shinobi nodded and hurried off on his task. To Susumu, Kondou said, “Go ahead and get information on troop details.” Susumu disappeared without another word.

“Sir,” Kai spoke up, “if I may suggest that I go and summon the rest of the Kyoto Oniwabanshuu to aid us.”

“Do so,” Kondou agreed before finally turning to the remaining shinobi of the Shinsengumi, extending the black rectangular paper towards her, saying, “Matsumoto, these are your orders.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, her tone completely devoid of any emotion as she took the folded paper and tucked it within her working tunic. When she prepared herself for battle, it was only then she would look at the target or targets that she had been ordered to assassinate. “Considering the scale of the battle, shall I assist Susumu in his task before it begins, sir?”

“Yes,” Kondou said after a moment of slight hesitation. “May fortunes favor your blade, Matsumoto.”

“May they favor all of us, sir.”

* * *

_Later…_

 

Susumu kept his head low as he listened to the murmurs from the other side of the cloth wall to the commander of all the forces that had gathered in the area just ahead of the enormous gate known as Hamaguri that stood as the first line of defense of the Imperial Palace. Lord Tokugawa Yoshinobu continued to address the various faction commanders and though Susumu could clearly hear what exactly Lord Tokugawa was saying, he chose not to tell any others that were around him for it was not his place to.

All of a sudden, he felt a familiar presence shift a bit and glanced over to see that Aya had not even moved an inch from the corner of the area they were currently waiting in. However, her presence was starting to fluctuate and he knew that she was slowly receding her presence from the world. It was a technique that most shinobi employed whenever they were about to go into battle, and it was the one thing that Susumu had not yet mastered, judging by how easily Yoshida Toshimaru had discovered him while he was trying to spy on the rebels months ago.

He could also feel Kai, along with the other Oniwabanshuu gathered in the area start their presence receding techniques. He briefly closed his eyes and started on his own presence, receding it as best as possible before opening his eyes again. Scattered around them were members of the Shinsengumi and Mimawarigumi and though many of them looked around in confusion, he noted that only a scant few actually understood what was happening with the shinobi around them.

There was a rustle and one of the many curtained off cloths that separated their area from the main planning area that Lord Tokugawa occupied was flipped open and the commanders and vice commanders of the Shinsengumi and Mimawarigumi stepped through. Susumu also saw Kashiwazaki Nenji, the commander of the Kyoto branch of the Oniwabanshuu step through, though the old man stood to the side, as if he were just an ordinary member of the defensive army.

Hijikata and the vice commanders of the Mimawarigumi stepped to the side as Kondou and the commander of the Mimawarigumi sat on the seats. Yamanami had been tasked by Kondou to lead those still scattered about in the city to the area once they were gathered, hence the other vice-commander of the Shinsengumi not being present for the moment.

As Kondou and the Mimawarigumi commander started to issue their orders on the positions they were going to take for the defense of Hamaguri, Susumu noticed out of the corner of his eyes that Aya had slipped away – most likely beginning her assassination mission. He focused back on what was being said and pushed all his thoughts, doubts, and fears to the darkest corners of his mind – there were more important things to focus on right now.

* * *

The Battle at Hamaguri Gates was already well into its prime by the time those of the Shinsengumi and other factions that had been sprinkled around Kyoto had finally arrived to provide reinforcements to their respective Shogunate forces…

Tetsu felt his breath leave him for a moment as he finally ran over the crest of the hill, towards the sounds of the battle, not aware that his feet had completely stopped him from going down the hill as the other members of the Shinsengumi surged past him. War cries hammered in his ears, but all Tetsu could see was just how destructive and _bloody_ the once-green grass had become. The sea of bodies struggling against each other, with their swords flashing in the hot summer sun, along with the acrid stench of so much blood spilt mingling in with the stench of the dead nearly overwhelmed him.

It had not escaped his notice that most of the bodies lying dead on the red-brown ground were rebel forces and that slowly, but surely, they, the combined Shogunate forces were winning and pushing the rebels back. As the surge of reinforcements rushed past him, he stumbled with the force and felt himself rolling down the hill, towards the sea of blood and bodies, unable to regain his balance.

He was suddenly scooped up by the scruff of his neck and immediately drew his swords out to swipe at whoever had grabbed him when a familiar voice cried out, “Hey! It’s me, brat!”

“Susumu!” he exclaimed, as the shinobi set him down on the ground as the surge of reinforcements trampled down and continued to push towards the steadily retreating lines of rebel forces.

A long low horn sounded across the battlefield and a resounding shout of elation came from the winning forces immediately after that almost drowned out the horn calling for the rebels to retreat. Tetsu did not have another chance to say a word as Susumu quickly disappeared into the crowds of Shogunate forces before he barely heard another voice shout out his name.

He turned around to see Okita accompanied by two other members of his unit catch up to him, all three of them battered, bloody, and exhausted-looking. He turned to go follow the others who were pursuing the fleeing rebels when Okita’s hand landed on his shoulder in a vice-like grip, preventing him from moving very far.

“Let them go, Tetsu-kun,” Okita said, as he looked up to see him nod at the two that had accompanied him continue on their way, joining the other Shogunate forces in the pursuance of the rebels from the battlefield.

“But--“ he began, protesting.

“I need your help to see if any of our people are still alive,” Okita patiently explained as the cacophony of the battle started to taper off into a chilling silence.

He glanced away from Okita and stared at the numerous bodies of both Shogunate and rebel forces and saw that more than a few in the distance were still alive, but barely moving, due to whatever injuries had been rendered to them. Not all who had participated in the clash had gone off to pursue the fleeing rebels, and many of those people were now walking around the red-brown field, looking for a sign of life in their comrades.

He blew out a sigh and gave a short nod, saying, “okay,” as he started on his task. The chilling screams of death and of anger still rung in his ears as slowly picked his way through the field of the dead, trying to find a sign of life in any of the bright blue-overcoat members of the Shinsengumi.

Not a quarter past the hour after the start of his assignment did something caught his attention. The gurgle and the crunch of a sword slicing through bone and flesh made him look up to see a slim, drab-clothed samurai with a wide-brimmed black hat on his head, cutting down the last of the rebels who had not fled. His skin crawled as he stared at the samurai. However, as if he knew he was there, watching him kill, the samurai turned towards him, and Tetsu felt himself freeze with fear.

Those eyes of the samurai…they were pitch black…

Tetsu’s hands automatically shot up to his throat as he tried to take a breath and felt his body involuntarily seize up and sink to the ground. He couldn’t breathe…he couldn’t look away… something about that samurai was making him continue to stare into those dark, depthless pools of eyes… He could _smell_ the bloodlust, feel the _hunger_ for wanton destruction as the samurai took a step towards him, sword held casually at his side…

_Akuma_ …

“Little insects such as you should be crushed in the battlefield,” he thought he heard the samurai whisper as the samurai took another step closer, with a devilish smile gracing his face. The darkness was starting to creep from the edges of his vision… the breath that he needed to cry for help not forthcoming…

_Help me!_

“Tetsu-kun!”

Despite the darkness that was slowly eclipsing his vision, his heart filled with relief as he heard Okita and saw the edgings of a familiar blue-white overcoat briefly fill his vision before settling down as the First Unit Captain dashed slightly in front of him, sword drawn out.

“Identify yourself!”

“Oh?” the nameless samurai said, turning his dark gaze from him and settled it on Okita – Tetsu felt a distinctly powerful _push_ blow by him, knocking him to the ground, though with his paralysis, he felt himself hit the blood-slicked ground with enough of a force to see stars as his vision continued to dim. “The little Mibu wolf wants to play?” the nameless samurai said.

He heard Okita grunt a bit and saw his sword shake a bit – Okita had also been paralyzed—no! The First Unit Captain had broken free of whatever had held him down for that brief instant and immediately moved into the Tennen Rishin Ryuu – Hiraseigan stance.

“Oh ho!” the samurai said, taking yet another step closer, this time with a dangerous smile on his face. “The little wolf doesn’t like to be restrained—“

A sudden surprised look appeared on the samurai’s face as Tetsu strained to see that Okita had narrowed his eyes in suspicion but had not yet moved. Tetsu tried to move his eyes as best as he could to see what had stopped the samurai from his speech, but all he saw was the fact that the samurai had been startled by something.

“Let the boy go, Kurogasa,” a chillingly sharp, yet dangerous whisper blew past Tetsu’s ears, carried only by the overly warm breeze of the late summer afternoon. If words were blades, he was sure that he would have been sliced from ear to ear. “The battle is over. Let the boy go and walk away.”

Tetsu saw those impossibly black pools of eyes turn straight back to him, and suddenly sweet air filled his lungs as he coughed, and _breathed_. He could feel himself move again as his body shook off the involuntary seizure, but remained on the ground, trying to still the tremors that ran through him. He looked up – Okita still had not moved from his stance and was watching the samurai with an oddly calm but terrifyingly furious look. Another chill crawled down his spine – this presence he felt from Okita was fearsome…

“Do you not also _feel_ it within you,” the samurai, Kurogasa, said out loud, the tone of his voice as razor sharp as a tip of a blade as Tetsu saw him step aside, turning slightly, revealing who had exactly made him stop. Tetsu blinked – he could _see_ Aya, but at the same time, there was something strange and it took him a moment to realize that he couldn’t even _feel_ her presence. There seemed to be a void of _nothingness_ where she was standing with a short sword held up at the samurai, tip _touching_ the samurai, and the blade already dripping heavily with blood.

“A lust for meaningless killings, including your own allies?” Tetsu heard Aya ask, the tone of her voice still dangerously sharp and cold. “No. Control that monster within you and I _won’t_ have to kill you.”

“Let your victims scream as they die and maybe I’ll just do that, _woman_ , the samurai venomously said, abruptly turning and walked away.

Slowly, Tetsu got back up as he saw Okita slowly relax to a less guarded state and sheathe his blade, but saw that Aya had merely flicked the blood off of her short blade and slowly walked away without a glance towards them. He could not help but shiver a bit.

“Tetsu-kun, are you all right?” he heard Okita ask and looked up to see that the First Unit Captain’s eyes had returned to his normal, kind look.

“Yeah,” he managed to croak out. “Who was that guy?”

“I have never seen him until now, but after hearing his nickname, I know who he is. He is a skilled warrior named Udou Jin’e, who is also known as Kurogasa,” Okita said in a quiet tone. “Rumor has it that he has assassinated many middle-ranking Choshuu rebels. We almost recruited him into the Shinsengumi a year ago, but did not, due to his uncontrollable and insatiable bloodlust.”

 

_It was one month after the Ikedaya incident that the Choshuu domain, whose men had been betrayed during that incident, sent an army to attack Kyoto. Hamaguri Gate became the site of a fierce battle between the Choshuu troops and the combined force of the Shogunate, Satsuma, and other domains. The Shinsengumi were also involved._

 

_Choshuu was utterly destroyed._

 

_This single battle cost many, many men to lose their lives on both sides of the conflict. However, the rebels succeeded in setting fire to Kyoto that lasted three days. Despite the overwhelming Shogunate victory, it took a few months for the city to rebuild what had been lost._

 

~*~*~*~


End file.
